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Criticism by China Raises Questions About Hong Kong Freedom

China on Wednesday accused Hong Kong's main opposition party of being unpatriotic and seeking to overthrow the central government in a broadside attack that raised fresh questions about whether the Communist Party is willing to tolerate political freedom in the nominally autonomous territory.

In a carefully orchestrated barrage of coverage in state-controlled media, some Hong Kong opposition leaders were accused of leading ''organizations that aim at opposing the leadership of the Communist Party and subverting the central government.''

Such political figures, state media said, should be excluded from holding high office.

A harshly worded commentary in Outlook, a high-level political magazine run by the official New China News Agency, said that people who participated in a July rally against imposing a new national security law in Hong Kong lacked sufficient patriotism to assume leadership positions.

Some 500,000 people took part in that rally and several mainstream political groups ultimately joined in opposition to the national security law, known as Article 23, dealing a stinging defeat to China and its supporters in Hong Kong.

The threat to disqualify a potentially significant number of elected politicians in Hong Kong is the most direct intervention in Hong Kong affairs since China reclaimed sovereignty from the British in 1997 and promised ''a high degree of autonomy'' for at least 50 years.

Chinese leaders have not spoken publicly about Hong Kong affairs in recent days, but they have sent an unmistakable message that they are opposed to popular calls to introduce full democracy beginning in 2007.

Under the Basic Law, or mini-constitution, residents are promised universal suffrage and are entitled to freely elect their legislature and chief executive as early as 2007.

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But China's efforts to compel Hong Kong to institute a national security law that many viewed as repressive mobilized the opposition and helped the Democratic Party, the main opposition group, win far more votes than expected in district elections there last fall.

That raised the prospect that the Democrats and other groups that favor open elections could take effective control of the territory's legislature as early as next fall, when the number of seats up for direct election rises to half.

''Beijing is making a big political gamble that they can scare people away from voting for the Democrats and keep control of the legislature,'' said Wu Guoguang, a specialist in Chinese politics at Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Chinese officials have governed Hong Kong with a white glove, speaking almost exclusively through the former shipping tycoon they selected to run the territory, Tung Chee-hwa. But lately Beijing has taken a hands-on approach and begun using political mobilization tactics reminiscent of power struggles on the mainland.

State media this month began raising questions about whether all of Hong Kong's political leaders are sufficiently patriotic, setting off a fierce debate among the pro-democracy and pro-China camps in Hong Kong about the qualifications of true patriots.

''This is a nasty trick that was used during the Cultural Revolution,'' said a senior editor at a leading party-run newspaper in Beijing, referring to the long political upheaval at the end of Mao Zedong's rule.